Guest Mode

[naishahmistry]

Overview

Participating and performing well in competitions like FHE and FSAE is a key component of NER and one of our primary goals. It allows us to showcase all that we have achieved in a season, from the car itself to how we manage our budget to how we organize our teams and projects. However, this information can often be overwhelming to those who aren't members of NER. This initiative aims to present all aspects of NER in a simplified version of FinishLine that enables new members, recruiters, sponsors, and judges to easily understand our project management workflow, team structure, and operations.

Stakeholders

Product Stakeholder: @naishahmistry, @sharonyang16, @yulanwang
Software Stakeholder: @Peyton-McKee, @walker-sean, @chpy04
Reference Users: Ally Kolesar, Alex Leblang

User Story

1. As a judge, recruiter, sponsor, or general guest to FinishLine, I would like to be able to easily navigate through their project management workflow, team structure, and team operations so that I can accurately evaluate their progress and achievements, as well as use this information to determine their contention for awards and potential for future growth.
2. As a member of the recruitment or competition teams, I would like to be able to provide an easy-to-understand version of FinishLine on QR codes and social media so that judges, sponsors, and recruiters can quickly and effectively view our work and save it for future reference.
3. As an admin/E-Board member, I would like to input data and key information specific to NER so that new guests can easily understand our work, purpose, and terminology without becoming overwhelmed or confused.

Success Metrics

The success of the Guest Mode feature will be evident when individuals who have little to no exposure to NER can effectively use FinishLine Guest Mode to learn about our team and sponsors, view our team structure, and understand our project management workflow, including our projects/work packages, gantt chart, change requests, and design reviews. They should feel confident in joining or entering an NER meeting with a strong foundation of how NER operates and what our terminology means.

Rollout Plan

This feature completed the design process by Dec. 20, 2024. It will be released to the development team in August 2025. Essential competition members and E-Board will be asked to test this feature in Spring 2026. This feature is expected to be fully adopted by June 2026 (by FHE/FSAE competitions).

Out of Scope

One thing that was out of scope for this project was creating a desktop version of Guest Mode due to time constraints. A future product initiative can be dedicated to creating a desktop version of Guest Mode and a mobile-friendly version of FinishLine for NER members.

Background/Context

Currently, FinishLine has two "modes" - one for members and one for potential new members. The version of FinishLine used by members requires significant knowledge of NER's project management workflow, team structure, and general approach of building a car. The version of FinishLine used by potential new members only provides introductions to each division in NER, a link to apply, and a link to explore our work, which leads them to a version of members' FinishLine without sensitive information. The primary issue with this system is that it is tailored to only two personas (members and potential new members) and does not provide any context or guidance to help the new individual navigate our team's methods and operations.

The goal of this initiative is to holistically redesign how guests view FinishLine and access our team's information, as well as help them gain a strong understanding of what we do, how we do it, and why it's significant. This redesign will focus on providing other personas, including recruiters, judges, sponsors, etc., with a brief yet comprehensive overview and encourage them to explore their areas of interest in more detail. To achieve this goal, we are implementing a mobile version of FinishLine tailored to guests at recruitment events and competitions who visit the website after scanning a QR code or recommended link so that they can view team data/information in a straightforward manner.

Acceptance Criteria & Mock-Ups

Sidebar

To guide new guests through our team's structure and operations, the sidebar will be broken down into five tabs: Home, Project Management, Divisions, Sponsors, and Info.

Home

When guests first visit the website (type in the URL, open a link, scan a QR code, etc.), they should be brought to the following page. Similar to the existing version of Guest/PNM mode, the home page consists of the FinishLine logo, a brief introduction to FinishLine and its significance in NER, key hyperlinks (Email, NER website, Confluence, GitHub, Instagram, LinkedIn), and featured projects set by leads/FinishLine administrators.

Project Management

When guests click on the "Project Management" tab (not the subtabs), they should be led to the following page. This is a dictionary-style page that explains key terms used in our project management workflow so that guests can then easily understand and find future pages. The definitions can be edited by FinishLine admin in Admin Tools and will be pre-populated using information in our Glossary Document before release.

Gantt

If guests click on the "Gantt" subtab or the "See Gantt Chart" button, they should be led to the following mobile-friendly Gantt chart. It should show roughly two months at a time and 3-4 teams on a full-screen page to avoid overcrowding. Users should be able to filter the Gantt Chart based on the cars (all cars should be available with their own checkbox, as well as "No Assigned Car" to show all), time range, division, and specific teams. The teams filter should be dependent on the subteam filter - if a guest selects "Mechanical" for division, then all of the options under "Team" should be teams in Mechanical.

 

Projects

If guests click on the "Projects" subtab or "See All Projects" button, they should be led to the first screen below. This will show all projects for the Mechanical, Electrical, and Software teams. The cards display the project number/name, the project lead and manager, the project timeline, the project description, and the stage the project is in (based on the active work package). This list can be filtered by division by clicking the buttons at the top of the screen. If the user clicks a grey button, then it will turn red and filter by that division. If they click it again, the button should turn grey and remove the filter. They should be able to select multiple divisions at a time. For more detailed filtering, they can click on the filter icon to launch the pop-up (second screen below).

 

If guests would like to gain access to more details about a project, they can click the "Learn More" button on that project's card from the landing page. That action will guide them to the Project Overview page below. Clicking the "Tasks" tab will guide them to the second screen below. Switching to the Changes tab will show a mobile-friendly version of the Change Log currently available within FinishLine projects. Switching to the Gantt Chart tab will show a filtered version of the Gantt Chart in the Gantt Chart section using only the bars for the selected project.

 

 

Change Requests

If guests click on the "Change Requests" subtab or the "See All Change Requests" button, they should be led to the page below, which lists all of the Change Requests in descending order. Each card specifies the Change Request Number, the submitter, the reviewer, the work package, the type of change request, and the status of the change request. This page has the same filters and filter functionality as the Projects page.

 

Design Review

If guests click on the "Design Review" subtab or "See Design Review Calendar" button, they should be led to the calendar below. The calendar should show all upcoming/scheduled design reviews for that month, as well as enable guests to click to past and future months to visually understand our schedule/progress. For more detailed information on past design reviews, guests can switch to the "Past Reviews" tab to see a list of our past research/design reviews in reverse chronological order. Guests can click on the "Notes" button on each review's callout to open the meeting notes/question document in a new tab.

 

Divisions

If guests click on the "Divisions" tab, they should be led to the first screen below. This is another dictionary-style page that provides an overview of what each division does and how it fits into NER. Clicking on "View Division" or a specific division subtab from the side bar will take guests to the second screen, which provides an overview of each team within that division. Clicking "Learn More" on any team will guide guests to the third screen, which explains the purpose of that team, displays its leads and members are, and showcases active projects.

 

 

• Note: The tags for each active project show which work package is currently active/ongoing to show which stage the project is in.

Sponsors

Since we would not like to make our budget and finances publicly available, we have replaced our Finance tab with a Sponsors tab to showcase and highlight our sponsors. This page includes a note to recognize our sponsors and all sponsor logos.

Info

If guests click the "Info" tab on the sidebar, they will be led to the following page that answers key questions about NER and FinishLine. These questions/categories and its answers can be defined in the Admin Tools.

Admin Tools

In order to accommodate these new features and allow flexibility for E-Board/Admin, the Guest Mode admin tools will be updated to include a stagnant table for definitions of key terms, a dynamic table for updating information on the Info page, and a section to add/remove featured projects. The terms in the Definitions table will be the ones listed below, and their definitions will be pre-populated using the Glossary Document. Admin can edit it by clicking the pencil icon, which launch a variation of the first pop-up, where it will show the Term as an uneditable field and the Definition as an editable field. The Info Page FAQ table can be updated by clicking the "Add FAQ" button to launch the "Add FAQ" model. Administrators can edit an entry using the pencil icon, which will relaunch the first pop-up for that specific question, and they can delete questions using the trash icon and confirm using the standard "Confirm Deletion" dialogue (second pop-up). To remove a featured project, admin can click the remove icon on that projects card. To add a featured project, admin can click the "Add Project" button, which will launch the existing pop-up for adding a featured project (third pop-up).